I am told that the proximity of punishment arouses real repentance in the criminal and sometimes awakens a feeling of genuine remorse in the most hardened heart; I am told this is due to fear.

The best way to keep a prisoner from escaping is to make sure he never knows he's in prison.

Pain and suffering are always inevitable for a large intelligence and a deep heart. The really great men must, I think, have great sadness on earth.

If you wish to glimpse inside a human soul and get to know a man ... just watch him laugh. If he laughs well, he's a good man.

Learning to love is hard and we pay dearly for it. It takes hard work and a long apprenticeship, for it is not just for a moment that we must learn to love, but forever.

People speak sometimes about the "bestial" cruelty of man, but that is terribly unjust and offensive to beasts, no animal could ever be so cruel as a man, so artfully, so artistically cruel.

It is better to be unhappy and know the worst, than to be happy in a fool's paradise.

Nothing is easier than to denounce the evildoer; nothing is more difficult than to understand him.

I think the devil doesn't exist, but man has created him, he has created him in his own image and likeness.

Don’t be overwise; fling yourself straight into life, without deliberation; don’t be afraid - the flood will bear you to the bank and set you safe on your feet again.

The most offensive is not their lying - one can always forgive lying - lying is a delightful thing, for it leads to truth - what is offensive is that they lie and worship their own lying.

And if insight were sufficient, if the inner life were the whole of life, their happiness has been assured.

The objection to fairy stories is that they tell children there are dragons, but children have always known there are dragons. Fairy stories tell children that dragons can be killed.

If you can get some of the devil's money to use for the Lord's work, if you have to borrow it, it is all right and carry on the work.

Success is nothing if you don't have the right people to share it with you're just gonna end up lonely.

There are worse things than getting a call for a wrong number at 4 am. It could be a right number.

Everybody likes their coffee different.

...even though you said yes to the wrong man, I hope that won't cause you to say no to the right one.

It is an old dream: To travel on the back of a benevolent sea beast down to some secret underwater garden.

How easy it must be when you had no secrets from the person you lived with." - Eclipse, page 208

Were all the letters sun, I could not see one.